---
title: "What’s the fastest way to assess whether business users are truly prepared for an ERP upgrade?"
date: 2025-11-15
author: "Dariusz Myśliwiec"
categories:
  - name: "How IFS Cloud ERP Transforms Business Operations Supply Chain AI and Legacy System Migration"
    url: "https://ifs-erp.consulting/ifs-cloud.md"
---

# What’s the fastest way to assess whether business users are truly prepared for an ERP upgrade?

Here’s how you find out in 48 hours:

 
### 1. Run a War Room Simulation

 Pull your SMEs, business leads, and a few C‑Suite sponsors into a room. Give them a realistic scenario: *«The cutover failed. Data didn’t migrate. Go-live is in 12 hours. What do you do?»*

 
- **Red flag:** If they freeze, defer to IT, or start blaming the SI, they’re not ready.
- **Green light:** If they outline clear steps — escalation paths, backup plans, who owns what — they’ve been prepped.

 
### 2. Ask Three Questions

 Pose these to your business users. Their answers will tell you everything:

 
- *«What’s the one thing you’re most worried about breaking during go-live?»* 
- **Bad answer:** *«I don’t know»* or *«The system.»*
- **Good answer:** *«Customer order processing because we haven’t tested the edge cases with [specific team].»*
- *«Who do you call at 2 AM if your critical report fails?»* 
- **Bad answer:** *«I’d email the helpdesk.»*
- **Good answer:** *«I call [name] in the delivery team, and here’s the backup process we agreed on.»*
- *«What’s your personal plan for the first 72 hours post-go-live?»* 
- **Bad answer:** *«Show up and see what happens.»*
- **Good answer:** *«I’ve blocked my calendar, prepped my team on manual workarounds, and know where the issue logs are.»*

 
### 3. Check Their Calendars

 
- **Unprepared teams** have no time allocated for testing, training, or issue resolution.
- **Prepared teams** have dedicated slots for UAT, dry runs, and hypercare support—*and* they’ve delegated BAU tasks in advance.

 
### 4. Review Their «Cheat Sheets»

 Ask for their personal notes, process maps, or quick-reference guides.

 
- **Unprepared users** have nothing or rely on generic training docs.
- **Prepared users** have custom checklists, contact lists, and workflow diagrams they built *themselves*.

 
### 5. Test Their AI Fluency

 Give them a hypothetical problem (e.g., *«A key report is wrong, and the SI is swamped. How do you diagnose it?»*).

 
- **Unprepared:** *«I’d wait for IT.»*
- **Prepared:** *«I’d pull the data manually, cross-check with [tool], and escalate with these details: [specifics].»*

 
---

 **The Brutal Truth:** If more than 30% of your users fail these tests, your upgrade is already in trouble. Fix it now — delay the go-live, intensify training, or bring in reinforcements. **Hope is not a strategy.**

 **[What concrete strategies can replace hope in ERP upgrade planning?](https://ifs-erp.consulting/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=82&catid=12)**